Sanjiepu’s grand sporting occasion– headhunting the Brown Anole

The Brown Anole Lizard, a foreign lizard species introduced into Taiwan, has had a huge impact on the ecological system of Sanjiepu in Shuishang Township, Chiayi County. On arrival in the area, you will be surprised to find many locals using elastic bands, with extreme accuracy, to hunt down the troublesome lizards – something that has become a kind of money making pastime for local farmers. Sanjiepu resident, Luo Xi-zhang, expressed that they received 10 dollars per lizard, and in the first year there were great numbers to catch, sometimes 1 or 2 hundred per day.

Now in the second year it is apparent that the number has decreased significantly. Professor in the department of life sciences, Mao Jun-jie, expressed that the Brown Anole Lizard’s main food is ants, and this has a huge effect on agriculture. Apart from nipping people and destroying the domestic ecosystem the Brown Anole Lizard has been found to possess other problems. An example of this are the intestinal parasites the creature harbors, parasites that are foreign to Taiwan’s ecosystem. Although the number of these lizards seems to have stopped rising, however the initial subsidy allowance to encourage trapping the lizards has already ran out.

Sanjiepu’s grand sporting occasion– ?headhunting the Brown Anole Lizard? (by CJ E-news)

URL:http://www.peopo.org/news/76566

(以下為中文對照)

三界埔夏日盛事　獵捕變色蜥領賞 ( 中正E報 )

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外來種沙氏變色蜥的出現對嘉義縣水上鄉三界埔的生態產生了影響。到當地你會發現，當地居民用一條條橡皮筋，精準地打中目標物，在夏季盛行捕捉沙氏變色蜥，而這也成為農民在平日賺取外快的一個管道。三界埔居民羅溪章表示，抓到一隻十塊錢，第一年抓當然數目比較多，一天抓一兩百隻也有，現在就已經連續實施2年了，數量有點減少。而宜蘭大學森林暨自然資源學系助理教授毛俊傑表示，沙氏變色蜥基本上牠其實吃的比較多是螞蟻，基本上對一些農業生態其實滿有影響的。沙氏變色蜥除了會咬人以及破壞生態之外，其實牠還有其他衍生的問題。譬如說像是腸道寄生蟲，這些寄生蟲不是台灣的種類。不過，今年沙氏變色蜥目前已到繁衍期，補助方案卻在民國九十九年照原定計畫停擺，政府單位至今尚未頒布任何相關法案。

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